Ezra sucks in a breath hard, feeling like his heart is clenching in empathy.
"Yeah." He rubs at his face. "I'm...gonna ramble a second, but I promise I have a point. You asked about my master, before. My first master was Kanan Jarrus. And if you don't know that name, I'll be sorry to hear it, but not surprised." Maybe he and Kanan are remembered on Lothal. He just hopes, really hopes, the rest of the Specters live well past the fall of the Empire.
"About 18 years into the Empire - a few days before I was taken out of the galaxy as I knew it- Kanan was killed in action."
He's silent for a beat, eyes shining, and swallows, before he presses on. "The place I was for most of a year - Temba - there were several Jedi. One of them was Master Kenobi, from a few months after the rise of the Empire. I'd met him before, and even though it was really only the once, he's still like nearly half the reason I'm a Jedi. So. He's my second master. And then, there in Temba, there was this reality warping spell. It gave us all memories of this whole other life, which I know sounds crazy. Where...he and I weren't Jedi, or even Force sensitive. I was just a regular student. And he was my much older brother, Ben, who had raised me. He was always there."
He looks down. "The truth is - the Empire arrested my parents when I was seven. I was a street kid until I was 14, and Kanan found me. Kanan took me in and gave me an amazing new family, who helped me figure out who I wanted to be. But that's...not the same as always having a family. So when that spell broke, Ben and I decided that it - it was ok to still be brothers. We could choose to make it true. Those memories are a little hazy, but they're there."
He looks back up. "But of course none of that has happened to Master Kenobi here. I get it."
no subject
"Yeah." He rubs at his face. "I'm...gonna ramble a second, but I promise I have a point. You asked about my master, before. My first master was Kanan Jarrus. And if you don't know that name, I'll be sorry to hear it, but not surprised." Maybe he and Kanan are remembered on Lothal. He just hopes, really hopes, the rest of the Specters live well past the fall of the Empire.
"About 18 years into the Empire - a few days before I was taken out of the galaxy as I knew it- Kanan was killed in action."
He's silent for a beat, eyes shining, and swallows, before he presses on. "The place I was for most of a year - Temba - there were several Jedi. One of them was Master Kenobi, from a few months after the rise of the Empire. I'd met him before, and even though it was really only the once, he's still like nearly half the reason I'm a Jedi. So. He's my second master. And then, there in Temba, there was this reality warping spell. It gave us all memories of this whole other life, which I know sounds crazy. Where...he and I weren't Jedi, or even Force sensitive. I was just a regular student. And he was my much older brother, Ben, who had raised me. He was always there."
He looks down. "The truth is - the Empire arrested my parents when I was seven. I was a street kid until I was 14, and Kanan found me. Kanan took me in and gave me an amazing new family, who helped me figure out who I wanted to be. But that's...not the same as always having a family. So when that spell broke, Ben and I decided that it - it was ok to still be brothers. We could choose to make it true. Those memories are a little hazy, but they're there."
He looks back up. "But of course none of that has happened to Master Kenobi here. I get it."